Putting the Pieces Together: Falkreath Pt. 5
Parched lips greedily drank down the gulps of water Arn offered from his canteen as the little, emaciated boy called "Simon" gradually grew more responsive as Arn tried to bring him back from the brink of death.
Once he'd gotten supplies, he set up camp inside the children's "cave" in a proper manner, with a small campfire and a torch further back in an old holder to give more light.
Illuminating the place revealed more than a few surprises. Firstly, the cave they were in was actually an entryway to old Nordic ruins of some kind with the stone slabs containing skeletons and draugr corpses laying in them on either side. Surprisingly, the Children didn't seem fazed by this, as if they knew their makeshift home was actually littered with the bones of the dead and one or two lifeless draugr bodies. The next surprising discovery was finding the smaller Breton boy named "Simon", maybe 5 years old, curled up shivering and gasping on the corner of one of the slabs in the back next to one of the Draugr bodies.
Arn rushed to get some water in him and tried to feed him some porridge, but the boy couldn't keep any food down. Ever since then, Arn had been rushing back and forth, shoving all the bones and Draugr bodies up into one of the slabs, grabbing more supplies from the now lifeless Bandit encampment, and fretting over exactly what to do next.
He couldn't just leave the children in the Wilderness all alone, particularly with one of them maybe moments from starvation, but he couldn't take them along to trudge around in the Wilds looking to wage bloody retribution on Sinding and any other Bandits unfortunate enough to cross his path.
All the while, every moment Lydia wasn't there felt like a visceral gnawing at his heart that kept gradually getting worse.
Between his scurrying around, worrying about Lydia and his predicament, trying to answer Cyrus and Sigrid's occasional questions every time he came back with supplies, and administering potions, food, and drink to the slowly improving Simon, Arn slowly stopped paying much attention to his surroundings outside the cave.
Upon nearing the cave again with an armful of furs and some more food rations, Arn was suddenly startled to hear the crunching of footfalls in the snow behind him.
Spinning to find an unknown but fiercely armored woman bearing down on him, Arn tried to react swiftly.
"TIID KLO UL!"
Time slowed to stand still as Arn dropped his supplies in a hurry before drawing his wooden shield and steel longsword, moving to outflank the new arrival as time slowly sped back up.
He was about to lay into the new arrival from behind when her voice froze his sword arm in mid swing.
"Arn?..."
"L-Lydia?" Arn half-stuttered, standing there shocked as she turned around and opened the front of the strange horned helmet to reveal her face beaming a wide eyed smile of surprise.
Arn didn't remember dropping his weapons. He didn't remember saying anything.
The next thing he remembered was finding himself fiercely embracing her, whispering her name into the side of her armored helmet as they fiercely clung to each other.
Then snow was falling on them. Arn thought maybe the skies had opened up on them again until he realized it was clumps of snow falling off the boughs of the tree that they'd crashed into in their wild embrace of reunion.
The cold impact of the snow brought Arn back to reality as he realized he was holding his Housecarl in a much more than friendly manner, and suddenly noted that her left arm hung limply at her side, instead of clasped to him as were her legs and other arm.
"What happened?" he gasped, setting her down and eyeing her over for any other possible injuries he'd missed in his excitement to see her again.
"What do you mean 'What happened to me?' I saw you fall off a cliff!" She frowned weakly as she tried to look him over.
Arn slowly helped her get her helmet off and eyed over the nasty gash on the side of her head. For a moment, they both seemed to be eyeing the other over for anything wrong before they were interrupted.
"Oh...hello there" Lydia declared as she turned and looked past him with surprise.
Arn turned and saw Sigrid and Cyrus both peaking at them from behind a nearby tree with wide eyes.
"Looks like you've made some new friends" Lydia tried to gather herself together as Arn motioned Cyrus and Sigrid toward them.
"This is Cyrus and this is Sigrid" Arn gestured at them as they slowly came forward, seemingly enthralled by the appearance of Lydia, though Arn had to admit the effect her reappearance had on him was much greater.
"They helped save my life" Arn continued as the two children stared at Lydia in wonder, Sigrid even going so far as to feel Lydia's face before noticing the gash turning quickly to Arn.
"Thee hath an Owie!" she exclaimed with worry, both children looking at Arn expectantly.
"We can fix that" Arn reassured them as he ignored Lydia's weak protestations, lifted her into his arms, and carried her back to the cave, tasking the children with bringing the things he'd dropped in the snow.
Much later, Arn warmed himself out of habit by his newly built campfire by the front of the cave as he looked across at the sleeping form of Lydia, bundled in a bunch of furs he'd retrieved from the Bandits camp.
Finding her again had buoyed his spirits far more than he would've thought. He should be tired after carrying things around all day through the snow, and spending energy healing her injuries, but even now, he was full of energy and excitement, optimistic again that they would be able to sort out any problem they encountered. He briefly relived the moment he'd taken her in his arms, overcome with joy at finding her again, but quickly pushed those thoughts away, choosing instead to consider her injuries instead.
The cut on her arm was deep, almost to the bone, but he had seen worse recovered from. The cut on her head wasn't deep, but if it had been any deeper, she might not have made it out of there. As it was, the size of the cut, and lack of immediate treatment likely meant the wound would turn into a scar. He didn't think she would worry about it. Most of it would be hid by her hair, but still, he'd seen other women warriors break down and cry at the prospect of a wound turning to scar tissue.
He looked back up again at Lydia's sleeping form, her curves only slightly obscured by the layers of furs Arn had retrieved from the Bandit camp.
Sigrid sat on her haunches nearby, as if her presence watching over her would make her injuries heal faster. It was remarkable how fast she'd latched onto Lydia. They hadn't even exchanged more than a few words, but from the moment they'd met out in the snow, Sigrid stayed almost right next to her, asking Arn every few minutes if she should get anything to help while he was healing the gashes in her arm and head.
Arn hadn't asked about the children's families. It wasn't hard to put two and two together as to what happened to them, but Arn didn't know anything about where they were from, where they were headed, did they have other family, did any others of their family group escape? All these were things he would have to find out, but asking about it was likely to bring back traumatic memories he didn't wish for them to endure.
It wasn't the first time Arn had encountered or rescued children out in the wilds, but all the other times, someone from the Guild took charge of them until they could find an orphanage or magistrate to take them, or someone summoned a priest or priestess from a nearby temple to take them in. Arn had never really had to do much other than the fighting part, though he felt a kinship with them in having been young and alone, cast out into a world without the guides or guardianship of parents to protect them.
Changing his focus again, he tried to get Simon to eat some bread and drink some water before he moved and sat down among a pile of books, scrolls, and satchels he'd retrieved from the Bandit overlook along with one or two Lydia had snatched on her way out from this "Champion's" hideout.
He was so engrossed in reading over the scraps, scrolls, and books, that by the time he looked up again, both Cyrus and Sigrid were curled up asleep on their slab of rock across from Lydia, and the fire was dying down. Adding some more wood to the fire, he continued reading long into the night, trying to make sense of just what was going on here, and occasionally checking to get Simon to take more water or food.
Cheerful chattering awoke him, and he groggily cracked his eyes open to realize he'd nodded off at some point while reading.
It was daylight now, but he realized another winter snow storm had set in as he looked past the huddled forms of the children by the opening to see large flakes whistling by in droves. Already, their tracked up portion by the entryway was covered in a fresh blanket of snow. To Arn's surprise, Lydia was even up and moving around, but he noted her left arm still hung loose and unused. as she sat and tended the fire while chatting with the children.
"I was explaining to them that they don't need to go looking for food anymore" Lydia tiredly croaked at him as she scooted over and handed him some small bread rolls and jerky.
"How is Simon?" Arn blurted out faster than he meant, remembering the little boy in the back of the cave he'd been trying to nurse back to health.
"I gave him some water and a few bits of bread. He kept it all down. I think he's improving" Lydia replied with an assuring smile as they both made their way back to see the small boy curled up in his now padded bedroll with fur blankets.
To both their surprise, the boy was awake and somewhat alert, his eyes growing wide with fear for a moment before Lydia shushed his whimpering and stroked his curled up arm reassuringly until he stopped trying to pull away as she lifted a canteen of water to his lips.
"They're so small...so frail" Lydia almost whispered to Arn as the little boy drank greedily from the canteen while still eyeing them both fearfully.
"Once they've killed or enslaved the adults, most Bandits can't bring themselves to just murder the children. So instead, they send them helplessly off into the wilderness, assuming the Wilds will kill them off in due time"
"Well, they won't succeed this time. This time, we found them first" Lydia replied, though Arn could tell she was trying to use it to encourage little Simon more than she was responding to Arn's statement.
"Hith eyeth are open!" came the familiar exclamation from the excited Sigrid, who had appeared next to Lydia and was looking wide eyed at Simon's improved condition.
"Yes, pretty soon he'll be able to outrun and out jump all of us. Isn't that right?" she smiled at Simon, who looked at each of them with a mixture of uncertainty and relief.
"Just need to keep getting food and water down, and he'll be good in no time" Arn chimed in, handing the little boy a small piece of bread roll, and watched with satisfaction as he took and ate it on his own power.
"We could speed things up if one of us went back to Knifepoint Ridge and got the supplies they left stashed there, not to mention all the things in the Champion's hideout that I had to leave behind. You could also deal out some justice to those...uh people we both know deserve some" Lydia tried not to curse in front of the children or fume as they walked back to take a seat by the fire.
"I don't like the idea of splitting up again" Arn replied after a short silence of pondering.
"The bandits will regroup" Lydia cautioned "and Sinding will flee...Talos knows where".
"We know where they will be" Arn muttered, looking back at the pile of papers and journals he'd poured through "and Sinding will not go far if he thinks this is the area his fabled 'white stag' is in."
At length, Arn and Lydia spent the morning sharing what had happened to each of them and what they had learned. What became apparent was that Arn had fallen off the cliff, had his fall broken by the trees, and was somehow pulled out of the river by the children. Try as they might, neither Arn nor Lydia could make much sense of the "pet deer" explanation.
From the writings Arn and Lydia had retrieved, it became apparent that Jarl Siddgeir himself had been in direct contact with three different groups of bandits: The Champion's camp, Feorus' Camp, and one last one run by someone named Rochelle the Red.
It seemed they had all at one time been working for Siddgeir, but for some reason, later turned on him, and now worked at the exclusive direction of this "Champion of Boethiah".
"I still can't believe that the Jarl of Falkreath himself would've set this up" Lydia shook her head as they sat near the campfire that night.
"The man clearly had a streak of cruelty about him...what I don't understand is...why go to such lengths?" Arn mused as he put another couple of pieces of wood on the fire.
"Maybe he just wanted more than what he could collect in taxes?" Lydia theorized out loud before taking a bite of a muffin.
"He could charge whatever he wanted. The Imperials didn't seem to care what he did as long as they kept him in power" Arn returned as he resumed his seat.
"You really think there's more to it than money?" queried Lydia pensively as she stared at the revived flames of the campfire.
"Too many things don't make any sense. Who is this 'Champion of Boethiah', and why was everyone taking orders from him? Why were there no Thanes in Siddgeir's Court? Why organize such a large operation just to swindle people of their goods when he could've set up a roadblock of Legionnaires to do the same thing outside of Falkreath? What caused the fallout between the Bandits and Siddgeir?"
"Something to do with the war?"
"If I hadn't seen some of the crazy things I've seen these last few months, I'd agree, but...something tells me there's a Daedra involved here" Arn quieted his voice as he eyed the children sleeping nearby, worried that even the mention of a Daedra around them would somehow drag them into knowledge of worse things than what they'd endured.
Nursing little Simon back until he was healthy enough to travel took longer than Arn would have liked.
Nearly a week went by and he was still barely able to stand, much less walk. Their supplies were running low, and Arn had taken everything left there was to take from the Bandit encampment in the way of food. A few more days and Arn would have to search out some wild game or they would start going hungry.
All this time, it seemed like the snow never stopped. Every time they looked out the opening, the blur of white snowflakes was all that could be seen. Gradually, the entryway began to fill with packed down snow, despite Arn digging it out every other day or so to go get more supplies.
Arn watched by the campfire as Lydia sat with the children further back in the cave, regaling them with stories of their previous adventures. Sigrid and Cyrus sat on either side of her, hanging on her every word, though Cyrus occasionally interrupted with odd questions only a child would wonder. Little Simon was curled up in Lydia's lap, not looking at anything in particular, but seemed to be listening.
Arn figured the little boy must've been through more trauma than the other two because it had been a week and he still hadn't spoken a single word to any of them. He would just nod and point at things.
It was a joy to watch the children bond so well with Lydia. While Cyrus seemed to be enthralled with the things Arn said and did, both Sigrid and Simon seemed afraid of Arn at times. Perhaps he reminded them too much of something they didn't want to remember.
Still, it warmed his heart to watch them fall asleep leaning on her side or sitting in her lap as she told them stories, or hummed songs to them. It meant they felt safe, cared for, protected.
This is what Lydia would be like as a mother to his children...
Where did that thought come from?!
Arn visibly shrugged as if the physical act would ward off whatever strange musings his mind turned to as he observed Lydia setting little Simon down and tuck him in his bedroll.
So caught up in his musings was Arn, that he failed to hear the soft snort of a large beast just outside the opening, nor did he see the large, white haired arm reach in until it was too late.
The first inkling Arn had that anything was wrong was when he felt something grab his leg, but by then it was too late to react.
Before he knew what was what, Arn was yanked out of the cave opening and hurled backward through the air end over end until the drifts of snow dragged his flight to a stop in a wet POOF of white powder.
"TIID KLO UL!" Arn sputtered out the word of power, slowing the snow and time itself to a stop as he rolled to his feet, drawing his sword and shield, and wiped the snow from his face to see his assailant.
It was a good thing too. Arn found himself looking up at three Frost Trolls closing on him, their features barely distinguishable among the driving snow, with a fourth Frost Troll, larger than the others, still crouched at the cave opening with his arm inside, reaching around for anything else he could drag out for the lot of them.
Arn had fought Trolls before, but they were always swamp or forest trolls, the smaller and less hardy versions of the white haired beasts that now stood around him.
Without a mage casting fireballs to stop their regenerating, this would be next to impossible.
Dawnbreaker did some mild fire damage, but Arn doubted that would deal significant damage to them.
"FUS RO DAH!"
As time sped back up, Arn's thuum shout knocked two of the trolls away into the snow covered thickets off to one side before he turned and ducked under the swinging grasp of the one left on his right side.
Arn caught the underside of the Troll's next swing with the blade of Dawnbreaker, a brief plume of flame visible at the cut as the Troll growled in rage, but didn't slow down.
Instead, it grew more furious, speeding up his swings and catching Arn off guard with a two handed punchlike thrust with two fists that Arn managed to block, but the force of it knocked him back and off his feet.
In that split second Arn found himself flying backward through the air, he heard a brief snort behind him and rightly deduced the other two Trolls hadn't been dealt a mortal blow by his Thuum shout and had made their way back out of the thickets.
"WULD NA KEST!"
Arn's body blitzed forward through the air and driving snow, his still raised shield battering into the face of the Troll that had just launched him backward, stunning it momentarily and allowing Arn to ride it down to the ground as it fell over with the weight of the impact.
As it hit the ground, Arn stabbed hard down through its head, the satisfying crunch of bone and flesh immediately ending its surprised howl.
Arn had no time to savor the victory, though, as a large hairy hand grabbed his left leg and hurled him through the air again.
It was the larger one that had been by the cave opening.
The driving snow had obscured its approach to the fighting and now as Arn's leg bounced off a tree trunk and he thudded into another snow bank, he realized that the snow would only continue to give the Trolls an advantage as it slowed his own movement down and kept him from seeing clearly.
He'd only just gotten to his feet before he found the remaining three Trolls bearing down on him.
"FUS RO DAH!"
Arn hit all three of the approaching Trolls with a blast of force, but it only knocked them tumbling into the snow, and didn't seem to harm them much at all.
A loud crunching sound of snow letting loose interrupted everything as Arn tried to peer back over his shoulder up at the mountain, but all he saw was the driving white dots of snow in the darkness.
He was about to slow time down to try and hamstring the large Troll when the slight sifting noise like the shifting of sand and growing crunching sound of snow grew louder and confirmed what Arn had feared.
An avalanche was coming.
"Arn?" Lydia hollered with urgency as Arn spotted her dark form through the trees and driving snow by the cave opening.
Arn tried to run toward her, but the snow hampered his movements and he heard the Trolls growl behind him.
The sifting noise grew louder and he looked up to see a white cloud rise up on the mountainside just above them.
"WULD NA KEST!"
Arn shot forward, stopping just in time to grab Lydia with one arm around her waist and dive through the cave opening just as the white cloud of snow descended on them.
Arn had dived right onto the campfire, but the sudden influx of snow as it gushed by and filled up the opening immediately snuffed it out and covered Arn and Lydia in an unwelcome blanket of wet coldness as they sputtered and gasped for breath.
The children had screamed and Arn could hear at least one of them crying as he helped Lydia to her feet in the now pitch dark cave.
"Don't worry. We're all here!" Arn tried to sound reassuring as he felt around for the torch to light.
Eventually, he got the torch lit and looked around to find Lydia consoling the three children, now huddled next to her as she sat on one of the slabs.
Silent sniffling was all the noise in the cave as Arn listened to yet more snow settling outside the entrance.
Had to be at least fifteen to twenty feet, based on what he'd seen and heard.
"Whado we do now?" asked Cyrus after another silence of watching Arn eye over the cave opening now filled with snow.
"We'll have to find another way out" Arn declared, quickly gathering up the essentials they would need.
"Do you think we might wait until morning. Maybe Simon will be able to walk by then?" Lydia pled in an uncertain tone as she looked down at the curled up boy with tears streaming down his face.
"With the opening now blocked, there's no telling how long the air will last. We have to go now" Arn replied, trying not to sound dire as he moved to the back of the cave and began moving aside the rocks and debris the children had piled in front of the crypt door.
It didn't take Arn long to clear the doors, but it did take some doing to get them open, eventually resorting to use brute force.
By then, Lydia had rigged up a sling to carry Simon on her back and prepared packs and supplies for the other two children to carry.
"It lookth thcarry to me" Sigrid's words echoed as they all stood in the doorway and looked down into the dim ruins lined with draugr and spider webs.
"Don't worry. We've done this before" Arn replied, not bothering to add they'd never had to do it while escorting three children. Nor did he know for sure what was down there or if it truly was a way out or not.
There was only one way to find out.
Author's notes:
1. Sorry for the long hiatus. I have 4 different writing projects right now and tried to work on some of the others for awhile. Unfortunately, when I came back to my fanfics, I tried to do another chapter for my Elisif centered one since I didn't want the timelines to get too far apart, but the politics just weren't coming together. Eventually I just fried my brain trying to sort it out and decided I needed to take a break. Took me a little while to get back into it, but here we go.
